Gender Ideology in the early 20th Century KKK and Postmodern White Supremacy

• In Event: The Violation and Defense of Rule of Law Across Time

Abstract

Women’s participation in white supremacist groups historically and more contemporaneously includes supporting active white supremacist male partners as well as distributing literature and socializing children using racist indoctrination techniques (Blee, 2003; 2008). Other empirical work studying white supremacist ideology illustrates women’s back stage roles in these groups and the groups’ patriarchal structure. This research conducts a content analysis of the “Kloran, an Original Ku Klux Klan” handbook dating from the early 20th century by exploring gendered and racist themes. We compare and contrast this historical literature to more contemporary white supremacist literature on the world- wide web. First we will identify changes in ideology revolving around gender roles within white supremacist literature and secondarily, we will use a grounded theory approach to elucidate a model explaining the developmental links between historical ideology and modern white supremacist doctrine.

Authors

• Rebecca Sue Katz, Morehead State University

• Sharon Michelle McIntosh, Morehead State University